The subject disclosure relates to disk drive components, and more particularly, to bond pad configurations for magnetic recording head sliders.
The assembly and testing of hard disk drive components may include components positioned adjacent to one another in a relatively tight spacing. The addition of components to assemblies may further encroach upon the spacing between one component and another. Maintaining spacing between components may be significant where adjacent components may inadvertently form an electrical connection.
For example, a hard disk drive magnetic recording head slider may include multiple bond pads that are eventually bonded to another set of pads on a suspension arm assembly. In a typical magnetic recording head slider, bond pads may be formed in a uniform rectangular shape. The bond pads may be arranged side by side spaced to one another and solder bonded to respective bond pads on the suspension arm assembly. Maintaining a minimum pad gap between adjacent pads may be significant in preventing solder during reflow from flowing off of one pad and bridging the gap between neighboring pads.
However, as bond pads may become smaller to accommodate additional bond pads in an area, the ability to test the bond pads for reliability may be affected. For example, a probe contacting a bond pad during testing may include a tip with a dimension larger than a bond pad dimension. Thus, the size of a conventional bond pad may be limited with respect to the size of the smallest available probe. Furthermore, the probe tip may scratch some of the metal off of the bond pad, thus hampering the effective bonding area of the solder to adhere to the bond pad.
Accordingly, there is a need for a head slider and a method of manufacturing thereof that can provide for enough probing contact area on a bond pad while maintaining an adequate gap between adjacent bond pads.